


Vocabulary

by spicycronch



Category: The Property of Hate
Genre: Hero's trying her best, Madras/RGB if you tilt your head and squint, Post-Canon, the whole gang's here but it's mostly just the main two
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22196419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spicycronch/pseuds/spicycronch
Summary: After everyone escapes from the World of Make Believe, Hero learns some new words. Her family learns them with her.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 44





	Vocabulary

There was a word for what happened in the months after leaving the World of Make Believe. _Recovery,_ and TOby resisted it every step of the way. He got snippy every time someone brought out the wheelchair and insisted on walking to and from physical therapy, even though it sometimes took him the better part of an hour with crutches. On the bad days, the ones where he couldn't move at all, they'd sit on the couch and talk. Dial chattered away and Hero tied TOby's hair up with bows. He was angry on bad days and Hero tried to take it in stride. TOby wasn't above apologizing, stiffly and sheepishly, when he crossed a line too far. But he tended to stay just an inch shy of the edge, with mocking insults and cutting questions. 

Hero learned that it was something TOby did on instinct, after so long trapped in a body unable to move. When Dial couldn't be there, she learned to not care, to tie her bows anyway or to hold his hand while they watched TV. Bad days were still better, after all.

On the worst days, Hero didn't see TOby at all. 

Hero thought it was one of the worst days until TOby walked out, poured himself a cup of coffee, and went back into his room. She didn't see him for the rest of the day, but it still put a smile on her face. 

There was a word for why Madras spent hundreds when they first returned. _Outlet_ , and she breathed life into her frustrations and sorrows in the form of paintings. Sometimes they were memories given form on her canvases, and other times they were simply patterns or color mixes she found pretty. They usually ended up as gifts on Christmas and birthdays, and she'd taken Hero to the studio exactly twice. The first time, there'd been a hundred canvases lined up in racks against the wall and four more paintings each in various stages of completion. Angry reds and muddled yellows dominated her work, and she didn't bother to look at the half-finished scenes at all. The second time, Madras hadn't nearly the same number. When pressed, she said she didn't want to refill her paints as often. Hero thought Madras looked happier, among her tinted pinks toned greens. 

The second time, Madras handed her a paintbrush and said _go._

There was a word for the panicked limbo Hero found herself in most nights. _Paralyzed_ , and Hero found that the times she could move only part of her body was the worst. She could twitch hey fingers or roll her ankles, but never both. Hero couldn't move her face or arms for minutes at the time, as if her body wasn't her own, she couldn't even control her breathing. Movement came back with a snap. She opened her eyes and pushed herself up, heart hammering and lungs bursting all at once. Hero pattered to RGB's room those nights and nestled under the crook of his arm, hummed melodies to the beat of her father's heart. 

There was a word for why RGB would lay on the couch for hours during the day. _Exhaustion_ , and he'd ask Hero about her day while battling sleep. She made a face and pulled the blanket over his head. They watched old black and white films while Hero did her homework, read her assignments aloud when they ran out of tapes. Sometimes RGB would sleep to the sound of Hero's French homework, other times he would return to work without having rested at all. The image of RGB's hat blocking the evening sun burned itself in her memory, and she wondered at why he never bothered to stop.

There was a word for why everyone got so snippy with each other after a few months. _Monotony,_ and at its worst Hero spent the entire day in a silent house. She tried to cheer up RGB by asking him questions about dancing. How come he needed special shoes to tap dance? Could he do flips? Could he flip other people? She thought that giving him an excuse to talk would make him rush into his long spiels like they always did, but his answers were a few sentences at best. But she wasn’t one to give up. She stole RGB’s hat from him, dashed under his arm, around the corner and up the stairs. Their house may have been big, but it wasn’t _that_ big. She ducked into his bedroom closet and waited for him to pass by, darted back out after his shadow passed the doorway. She’d nearly made it back down the stairs when his cane caught her by the collar. 

He was mad at her, if the scolding was anything to go by, but he didn't protest when she insisted on at least putting on cartoons while he sulked on the couch. And if he laughed at the jokes after the third episode, well, Hero just smiled and didn't say anything.

There was a word for the awkwardness in Magnus' speech and in his actions. _Coping_ , and he adamantly refused to unload his problems onto a child. Hero pointed out that it had been a long time since anybody saw her as _just_ a child, but Magnus stuck to his principles all the same. He was the steady one, all things considered, the one who kept everyone out of jail and offered a broom to sweep up their messes. In long midnight chats about their escape from Make Believe, he was quick to offer a word of advice or suggestion. Always, always he said that this was their happy ending. The part of their story that they got to choose. Almost three years after their escape and hundreds of chats later, he finally cracked. 

Hero came home from school to find the living room overtaken by birdcages. About a dozen in all, each one empty. The birds themselves were all resting on Magnus as he, quite regally, laid face down on the floor. 

Hero thought of Julienne and what she did whenever RGB engaged in his dramatics and squatted by Magnus' shoulders. 

You're handling everything magnificently, she parrotted. 

Magnus didn't reply. 

You… you want to talk about it? 

Not at the moment, no. 

Okay. Do you want a snack? 

….that'd be lovely. 

'kay, she said as she wandered into the kitchen. 

She watched Magnus move all the birdcages as she munched on peanut butter and celery and snuck raisins to one of the canaries, and that was the end of that. 

There was a word for the calm that Madras had every time one of them stormed out the house. _Faith_ , and she explained it to Hero after one too many nights worrying over whether this was the time RGB finally left her behind. She didn’t have faith in RGB’s cleverness or his intellect, goddesses no, but that was why she could believe so easily. If Madras trusted what RGB said in anger- that they were living out the aftermath and their prime was behind them- then there was no reason to believe that he wouldn’t come back. Being around people certainly was easier.

We all love him too, even if the dummy doesn’t get it, Hero said petulantly. 

Madras laughed hard enough that Hero protested, her little _what!_ drowned out by the chuckles choked behind a plaid sleeve. 

Yes, Madras said, I suppose we do. 

There were so many words for what Hero felt, watching her family grow and come to care for each other again. More than she could name or find in any book or dictionary. There was the word for the safety she felt wrapped in her family’s arms, for the joy Hero felt every day, surrounded by people who loved her. There was a word for the place she returned to every day, where her family ate and sang and played together. For the place they'd carved out in the world before, in this one and the next.

There was a word for it, and it was _Home._

**Author's Note:**

> This has been sitting in my drafts for a year so I figured might as well-


End file.
